


move the stars for no one

by callunavulgari



Series: Dark Month Collection [53]
Category: Labyrinth (1986), Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Movie Fusion, Fae & Fairies, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-05
Updated: 2017-10-05
Packaged: 2019-01-09 07:19:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12271602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callunavulgari/pseuds/callunavulgari
Summary: “You have no power over me,” Rodney whispers, just to see the way that the Goblin King’s eyes narrow - how he steps closer, until his narrow hips are pressed up against the footboard. He reaches out, curling long, elegant fingers around the cold metal rungs between them, and though he hisses out low through his teeth when he finds the sting of iron waiting for him, he does not look away.He is a looming figure in the shadows, a slash of moonlight thrown across his face illuminating the smirk that sits there. He slouches in towards Rodney, sways toward him, his clever eyes hooded, and smiles like he’s won something. Asks, “You sure about that?”





	move the stars for no one

**Author's Note:**

> Back in 2010, I wrote a Supernatural/Labyrinth crossover and to this day, it's one of my favorite things that I've written. A month or two ago, two things happened. The first was that I stumbled across a certain prompt list that contained the following dialogue: ["You have no power over me" / "You sure about that?"](http://callunavulgari.tumblr.com/post/163548075745/prompt-list) The second thing that happened was one of my friends reblogging a link to [Wild Peaches](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11239491), which basically rekindled my love for all things Labyrinth and is utterly fabulous. Read it. Treasure it.
> 
> A lot of the inspiration behind this came from that fic, along with my own from 2010, and from an article that I'd read about a version of script that had Sarah realizing there was no solution for the labyrinth because the Goblin King used it to keep people from getting to his heart. And I'm sorry, but if that isn't John Sheppard I don't know what is.
> 
> This got a little bit unwieldy on me, mostly because it wouldn't settle into one genre. Some days writing this felt the way I wanted it to, slow and tired, with a shock of something like fear. Other days it felt like pure and utter crack. Somedays I felt like the only way I would conquer this was writing a million words that ended with the fae parading around Atlantis. Because of this, I almost didn't finish it, but last night I sat down, drank a glass of wine, and told myself that I was going to finish this. Somehow, someway. It wouldn't be the 20-30k slow burn that I'd envisioned, and no, I was not going to have the Goblin King follow Rodney to Atlantis, but it. would. end.
> 
> So look at that, my first, and hopefully not last offering for Dark Month.
> 
> For those who like music while they read: [If I Apologized](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QdSUBqhCOk) and [Close To You](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVyZXHEhlHE), from the Mirror Mask soundtrack. And of course, [Within You](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v43wJeoFkCY). All three of these were played basically on repeat.

“Love me,” the Goblin King had said.

In the aftermath of the labyrinth and all its wonders, the very least being the Goblin King himself, Rodney tries very hard not to.

 

When Rodney was young, he gave his sister to the Goblin King.

He hadn’t exactly meant to, and spent thirteen very long hours trying to get her back. More dream than fairytale, the labyrinth was filled with wonderful, fantastic, _horrifying_ things - strange, unbelievable creatures filled its narrow corridors, traps and puzzles awaited him around every corner.

In those early hours, it was as if the labyrinth had been built for him. Unceasing challenges, puzzles that had truly given him pause, a new world that dazzled and delighted him. Rodney had wandered the halls in a state of wonder, marveling. The hours had crept by, a thick film of something gathering in the corners of his brain, making him creaky and slow. It took entirely too long for him to grow frustrated.

The labyrinth, Rodney had realized, was not something that one won. It was not something to be conquered. It wasn’t meant to be. It was _armor_ , better than any castle walls, from its twisting hallways to the fog-filled forests.

And the funny thing was, if Rodney had never bitten into that peach, he never would have found Jeannie. The Goblin King, who built a labyrinth to guard his heart, all but invited him inside.

All he’d done was hand Rodney a piece of fruit.

 

 

“You’re good at this,” the Goblin King tells Rodney. He’s sprawled in the vee of a nearby birch, his whole body reclining comfortably against the branches, heeled boots hovering several inches above the muck. There’s a tuft of brown hair hanging down over one eye and a horrible smirk on his face. Rodney turns to glare at him, one hand pressed hard over his furiously pounding heart.

“Maybe you’re just bad at it,” he bites out waspishly, watching with relish as the Goblin King’s eyes narrow, the smirk melting into a scowl. Rodney kicks at a wet clod of mud and hopes that it finds its way onto the long, dark coat that his worship has hanging around his shoulders.

It doesn’t.

“Maybe,” the Goblin King says with a shrug. And then, “You should call me John.”

Rodney stops kicking at the mud and stares at him. “John.”

The Goblin King smiles with sharp, pointed teeth. His eyes - a murky, but perfectly ordinary greenish-brown at first glance - are slitted down the middle like a cats.

Rodney makes a face and John laughs at him, leaping down from his perch on the tree to land an inch or so above the ground. When he sees Rodney looking he ducks his head, smirking politely.

“I inherited early,” he says, and before Rodney can ask him what _that_ means, he adds, “Eight hours and seventeen minutes, Rodney McKay.”

 

On Rodney’s first day at Caltech, a raven swoops down from the branches of a nearby tree and lights upon his shoulder. The students milling around him turn and stare, but fortunately, most of them don’t have time to wonder about the weird sixteen year old with a real live bird on his shoulder.

“I hate you so much,” he mutters to it, and stops next to the entrance of the building that houses his first class. The bird’s talons dig into the meat of his shoulder and Rodney winces. “I’m not bringing you in with me. It’s not even allowed.”

The raven croaks at him, a terrible throaty noise that makes Rodney’s ears ring. He huffs at it, making a judicious attempt to jostle it free.

It doesn’t work.

He sighs, eyeballing his wristwatch and then the doorway. He glares the bird down some more, sure that he’s not imagining the fact that its eyes are more green than black.

 _“John,”_ he says at last. “Get off.”

The bird takes to the air, sticking around to fly several tight circles above his head, before setting off in the general direction of the horizon. Rodney’s shirt smells like honeysuckle, and there are flowers poking up through the autumn leaves at his feet.

Scowling, Rodney stomps his way inside.

 

“I know you’ve been watching me.”

The Goblin King blinks. He’s wearing a pair of rather simple breeches and a white tunic, only the faintest glint of gold woven into the collar and along the sleeves. There’s a piece of straw dangling from his mouth. Like this, he doesn’t look much like a king. Like this, his hair tousled and a lazy smirk across his lips, he doesn’t even look fey. He looks human.

It’s easy sometimes, to forget.

“Have I?” he asks, unconcerned.

Rodney sucks a breath in through his nose, and lets it out abruptly. He has five hours left to find his sister. He doesn’t have time for this.

“I could give you a hint,” the Goblin King teases, his smirk going improbably wider.

“Nothing here is freely given,” Rodney snaps.

John looks at him, wounded. “Not so!”

“Yes so,” Rodney mocks. “A favor for a favor, isn’t that the way it goes?”

John huffs, but doesn’t deny it.

 

When Rodney gets back to his dorm that night, the raven is perched outside his window. It knocks its beak against the frame and caws once, loudly.

“Really?” Rodney sighs, and goes to let it in.

It hops onto his comforter, feathers ruffling as it sets itself to tugging at the little round buttons at the edges of his pillowcases.

“You may as well show yourself,” he tells it, throwing himself down into his desk chair. He gives the bird a withering look. “If you’re going to be assaulting me at school, you should at least do me the honor of speaking to me outright.”

The bird goes still, every single feather held quivering, unmoving. It stays a bird.

Rodney looks at it, the careful way it’s holding itself. Like it’s waiting for something.

“Oh yes, my most sincere apologies. I’d forgotten how big your kind are on rules,” Rodney says, rolling his eyes. He clears his throat loudly and says in a waspish, singsong sort of voice, “John, John, the Goblin King! I do so wish you weren’t a fucking bird.”

There’s a sort of popping sound and John steps up and out of the bird, carefully settling himself at the edge of Rodney’s bed. He blinks several times and for a moment, just a moment, his eyes are gleaming and bright, his teeth sharp, his mouth too wide. He is a horror, something not quite right around the edges, cold and otherworldly.

It’s only a moment, his form settling as he does, the creases smoothing out and coalescing into the shape that Rodney’s more familiar with. He smiles at Rodney, his teeth white and perfectly ordinary, and says, “Hello, Rodney.”

 

Rodney doesn’t make friends in the Labyrinth. He makes allies and enemies, and several creatures that are somewhere in between, but Rodney, at fifteen years old, did not precisely know _how_ to make friends.

He had a guide, for a time.

But mostly, Rodney was alone, wandering the halls in silence, thinking. The Goblin King himself had been there a handful of times, overseeing his progress, trying to throw him off course or distract him.

“I just did what you asked,” he had whispered in a coaxing voice.

“I’m just thinking of your well-being, Rodney.”

At the end, just before the peach, he had taken Rodney by the arm and looked him in the eye. Some part of him had been coming unravelled, and with something like confusion on his face, he’d breathed, “You _wanted_ this. I’m just trying to give you what you _want_.”

If he’d had a guide, Rodney thinks later, he likely never would made it to Jeannie in time. After all, it wasn’t as if any of the Goblin King’s subjects truly knew his heart.

 

Over the next several years, John visits often. The first year, he seldom shows himself as anything other than that abominable raven. A flash of feathers out of the corner of his eye, a rat-tat-tat against the window late at night, a streak of black dive bombing him between classes only to go wheeling away after, croaking with throaty laughter.

One week, when Rodney is particularly irritable, he makes the mistake of snapping, unthinkingly, “If you’re going to make a habit of stalking me, I wish you’d just do so in a form that didn't _molt_.”

When he blinks, John is sitting on Rodney’s unmade bed, his long legs crossed at the knees. Bare toes wiggle happily against the sheets. His grin is huge and ominous, his eyes glinting as he drawls, “Now why didn’t you just say so?”

Rodney regrets it immediately because now instead of coming home to a bird at his window, Rodney has John laid out all over his furniture, his throat tempting and pale as he flips mindlessly through textbooks and research papers. His fingerprints smear along the edges sometimes, thumbprints of silver glitter that never quite wipe off.

Rodney’s entire room smells like flowers.

He didn’t grow up on fairytales. All of his knowledge comes from after, when he’d come home from the Goblin King’s kingdom with his sister in hand, exhausted and worn, but _hungry_ for answers.

The library had provided him with some answers, glimpses of the creatures that he’d seen, but the real answers had come from the older tomes rather than the fiction crammed onto easily reached shelves.

Rodney would always be a man of science. He didn’t much care for stories, preferring instead to lose himself to equations and outdated formulas.

Even he knows that he’s courting disaster here. He doesn’t leave offerings of milk and honey out on his windowsills or hang bags of sharp-smelling herbs above his doorway. He’s left himself vulnerable in a way that he never would have when he was fifteen.

Rodney wishes with his every _move_ , invites John in to touch his clothes, his bedding, his books. _Him_.

“Don’t you have a kingdom to run?” he snaps one day, when John is lounging around the research lab looking lazy and fuckable, loose gray pants hanging low on his hips. They’re alone now, but the sleepy-eyed redhead from his early morning lectures had lingered, her tired eyes growing hazy and strange the longer she looked at John.

Rodney had recognized the look, and wished that he hadn't.

John shrugs his shoulders, not looking too concerned.

“They’ll manage,” is all he says.

 

Rodney doesn’t remember much about the ball. He remembers the heavy taste of the peach on his tongue, how the sweetness of it had lingered in his mouth after. He remembers glitter and masks, John’s breath on his lips, the feel of his arms around Rodney as they swayed.

He had smelled so real, his cheek pressed warmly against Rodney’s.

It had been like a dream, drifting and quiet, the memory blanketed in something like cotton. The clock chiming had shattered it, but sometimes, in the quiet moments where he’s not quite awake, Rodney wonders what would have happened if he’d never woken up.

 

  
“John is a stupid name for a goblin,” Rodney tells John one day. He will be graduating later that day, two degrees tucked neatly under his belt, and has had to begin to consider the offers that have been arriving steadily since his freshmen year.

The sun is shining and John is sitting on the floor of Rodney’s empty dorm, feet tucked under his knees. He’s quiet, oddly so, a speculative look on his face as he gazes into empty air.

“John isn’t really my name,” he says dully, not bothering to look in Rodney’s direction. His eyes track something that Rodney can’t see.

Rodney blinks, and absurdly, feels _hurt_ by it.

“Oh,” he says quietly. “I thought-”

John looks at him in a way he hasn’t in- well, years. His face is still, his eyes dark and cold. His mouth quirks upwards into a humorless smirk. It’s almost a grimace, without a trace of his usual good-natured charm.

“You thought that I would give my _name_ to a human?” He laughs, high and sharp, and a noise like static fills Rodney’s ears, like the world is laughing with him.

“But I-” he starts, fear and anger beginning to seep in where the doubt has left ragged holes.

“But what, _Meredith_?” John bites out, getting to his feet. He looms, a fearsome shadow on the wall, the monster that Rodney had half forgotten existed beneath the pleasant exterior. “It isn’t as if you offered me yours.”

Rodney swallows.

“You have no power over me,” he says, weakly.

John narrows his eyes and steps closer, a hand coming up to cradle Rodney’s cheek. His fingers are longer than they’ve ever been, longer than any humans have any _right_ to be, and tipped with sharp black talons. There are feathers poking out through the skin of his wrists and his eyes aren’t quite human anymore, but Rodney’s body still warms at his touch.

“Don’t I?” he asks, quiet as a whisper, his breath cool against Rodney’s mouth.

At Rodney’s quick indrawn breath, he smiles and disappears.

 

Rodney had come out of the Labyrinth thirteen hours after he’d entered it, triumphant, with a sleeping Jeannie tucked against his side. He had put her to bed, waited patiently until his parents returned home, and then slept for the next thirteen hours.

A raven had sat at his window that night, a silent sentinel, unmoving until Rodney began to slowly wake the next morning. Only then had it shaken the dew from its wings and taken flight.

 

Sometimes, when Rodney isn’t paying attention or when he is very tired, he’ll catch glimpses. John’s eyes, green and slitted like a cat's in a puddle’s murky reflection. A glimpse of a dark silhouette standing just behind him in a darkened mirror. A flash of dark feathers. A rapping against his window. A familiar croaking laugh.

Rodney begins to leave an offering of milk on his windowsill. He could leave a line of salt, a bag of pinched herbs, could wear iron around his neck and wrists. Wall off that part of his life forever, protect himself from the Goblin King in case he ever comes calling. The small part of Rodney that remembers the fear that came with that day urges him to do that.

Forget the goblins. Forget the labyrinth. Forget their king.

And yet, each morning, he looks for the milk.

Each morning, he finds it untouched.

“Fine!” Rodney yells one night, alone in his new apartment. “So I didn’t tell you my real name. Big deal, you big baby! I’ve been answering to Rodney since I was _five_!”

He sulks afterwards, still surly but faintly embarrassed when one of his new neighbors stops by and politely warns him that the next time Rodney felt the need to shout things at three in the morning she would be calling the police.

That night, the saucer holding the milk is knocked off of his windowsill completely. It lays, cracked and despondent in the alleyway below. A stray cat laps at the last drops of milk clinging to the side. It blinks lazily when Rodney opens the window, and looks at him.

He glares down at it. There is nothing to suggest that the cat is anything other than an ordinary cat. It’s too skinny, it’s coat a nice tortoiseshell that would be more appealing if the poor thing wasn’t crawling with fleas. There’s a scab on its right ear and another on its nose.

Rodney sighs. “I suppose you’ll enjoy the milk more than he does.”

It meows at him, ear twitching.

He adopts the cat.

 

“Fear me,” the Goblin King had said, his nonchalant mask cracking down the middle. His face twisted, wretched and wanting, before he’d looked away. “Love me.”

He was lovely and terrifying to behold, yet Rodney did neither.

“You have no power over me,” he’d replied, and curiously, he’d been right.

 

He doesn’t know what wakes him. Perhaps it’s the cat growling unhappily in the corner of the room, the fur along her back standing on end, ears flat. Or maybe it’s the rumble of thunder outside, a storm not yet come to pass, but on the horizon.

Rodney blinks into the quiet dark, head muzzy.

He breathes in deep and smells honeysuckles.

“You have no power over me,” Rodney whispers, just to see the way that the Goblin King’s eyes narrow - how he steps closer, until his narrow hips are pressed up against the footboard. He reaches out, curling long, elegant fingers around the cold metal rungs between them, and though he hisses out low through his teeth when he finds the sting of iron waiting for him, he does not look away.

John is a looming figure in the shadows, a slash of moonlight thrown across his face illuminating the smirk that sits there. He slouches in towards Rodney, sways toward him, his clever eyes hooded, and smiles like he’s won something. Asks, “You sure about that?”

“No,” Rodney admits and pushes himself up. The cracked saucer is in John’s hand, empty. Rodney licks his lips. “Not at all.”

“I love you,” he offers quietly. It’s the only secret he has left.

John cocks his head, letting go of the bars and coming around the side of the bed. He is human enough, save the glint of gold in his collar and the slight sharpness of his teeth. He smells real, and absurdly, Rodney wants to dance with him.

“Nothing is freely given,” John says, but it sounds like a question. There isn’t an apology in his eyes, but Rodney hadn’t expected there to be one. The empty saucer in his hand was proof enough.

Rodney shrugs. “Your rules, not mine.”

John narrows his eyes, but he’s already taking a seat on the bed beside him. “But? What will you have of me in return?”

Rodney shrugs, “Pretty sure I already have it.”

John’s eyes glint with a hint of good humor, and he leans in. Rodney touches his cheek, slides his hand around to cradle the base of his neck and draws him in.

 


End file.
